


Second Best.

by HufflepuffAlchemist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Headcanon, Multi, Post-Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Unrequited Love, everyone deserved better, kind of a character study?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-09
Updated: 2020-05-09
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:00:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 404
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24093976
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HufflepuffAlchemist/pseuds/HufflepuffAlchemist
Summary: An interpretation of Lupin and Tonks' relationship.
Relationships: Remus Lupin/Nymphadora Tonks, Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
Kudos: 9





	Second Best.

She always knew. The second he came to her, she _knew_.

She wasn't pretending she didn't love him-she did. By Merlin, she did. That didn't mean he loved her, though. Not in the way she did him. Everyone knew his heart belonged to _him_ , and that _he_ had loved him too. So when he first came to her, she knew that whatever he was about to tell her was a lie. That the only reason he was doing so was because he saw her as a replacement.

She always saw him mentally comparing her to _him_. Their similarities, their differences, what _he_ had that she didn't. Why he could love someone whose death he'd never get closure for, because they had no body to bury. Part of it was their history, of course, but the way it ended the first time was (obviously) far from ideal. What did her mother's late cousin have that made all that pain worth it to him?

She acted like she had no idea about it. He acted like he had moved on. They both knew the truth, though, and she never pretended that it didn't hurt. It did, but not just because he didn't love her. In a weird way, it was because he couldn't bring himself to. He seemed to think that if he ever loved her, he'd be betraying _him_.

If asked, she'd say it all came to a head after Greyback attacked Bill. He and Fleur still got their happy ending, and that made her realise she'd never get hers. Even if she went on to love someone else, they'd never be him. That was what drove her to expose him, to make him face what was happening to them. In a sense, she'd won, but in another, she'd lost, as she had fully driven him away from ever being able to move on to her.

She hated everything about them from then on. Part of her knew her hatred was irrational: it wasn't anyone's fault that they didn't work. Yet another part of her, the part that fell out of love, _needed_ it to simmer so that he'd always be aware of what he was "doing" to her.

In the end, it didn't matter anyway. Even if she didn't love him anymore, she wasn't cold enough to walk away. He wasn't an awful person, and she still cared about him. It was just...complicated.

**Author's Note:**

> You ever see characters you love in a relationship that just doesn't work, mainly because it came out of nowhere & was underdeveloped? Yeah, that was always how I saw Remus & Tonks. Then recently, I was re-reading some of the books (lockdown)...Sirius & Remus are such a married couple I dunno whether to laugh or cry. Either way, that was what inspired me to write this. I wasn't trying to bash/vilify anyone, so I apologise in advance if it comes off that way.


End file.
